Isolation
by L. Nevada
Summary: This a short story of a doctor who has spent his entire life avoiding people and living in isolation. It is on this night when the man returns to his cabin and he is met by an intruder who breaks into his home with the intentions of doing him harm. Yet it turns out that, through this brief and violent encounter, the doctor finds what he has spent his entire life searching for.


Author's Notes: This story originated as a short writing piece for an English class. The prompt was to write an obituary and describe the death as it actually occurred. As it was originally used for school, I don't believe the violence depicted in this work is particularly graphic or in-depth. Also I have tagged or marked this story saying it involves rape, but this is not strictly speaking the case. Any dark themes in this work are completely subjective and up for interpretation. All the themes tagged can be inferred from the story, but you can also simply read it as it is written. Nevertheless, you have been warned. Please leave a review to let me know your thoughts. Enjoy…

On untouched property,

A total of ten acres of land,

Surrounded only by hills of snow:

White footprints laid a trail to my cottage.

The clock struck one after the midnight hour-

This was when my door slammed closed.

Hanging my dark coat on a rusted hook,

Which many would have said corresponded my personality,

I bolted the front door firmly shut.

Then, in the dark, the sound of padded paws approached

And nails clicked across hard wood.

I had awoken my innocent pup with my entrance

And, as always, he greeted me happily.

I always claimed it was isolation,

That which I craved most in the world.

Yet I could never resist the gentle touch of a purely kind animal.

Max, tail wagging in excitement,

bounded through the house to halt at my feet.

My friend, my only companion,

The only relationship I had ever possessed with another living being,

Without any resistance.

And even he, though he may be gracious,

For, if no other reason, that I feed him,

Grew bored of our short routine-

Returned to the bedroom.

He left me.

Alone in the dark entry.

I trudged on through the empty house.

Not a candle lit,

Not a star in the sky to shine through the covered windows of my barren cabin,

On this gloomy night.

I trudged on,

Into the kitchen,

Expecting to light the stove to prepare tea before turning in for the night.

But I would never reach the stove.

I guess it just wasn't meant to be.

For it was on this night,

Dark and still,

When I would light a total of four candles,

Each scattered precariously throughout my small kitchen,

Before an invisible figure,

Strikes.

I lost all control of my body in that moment.

Tears streaked down my face as I dropped like a slab of lead.

My body connected harshly with the wooden flooring

Which responded for me.

The noise it produced alerted Max.

Paws approached from several rooms over once again,

More frantic,

Now with added sounds of distress.

I lifted my head,

Suddenly twice as heavy as it had always been,

To address my beloved canine

Which brought another blow from my attacker.

I realize now,

That it's amazing that I didn't black out,

From either force or resulting pain,

Considering the assault was wielded by a rolling pin

And the blood that drained out of my face.

I would be lying if I said I never considered that, in that situation,

Becoming unconscious could have saved me that night.

But did I truly want to be saved?

My head throbbed from the second swing

And there was simply nothing I could do to warn my loyal pet.

A moment later and he entered the kitchen.

Concerned whines, turned into vicious snarls,

Only broken by the gnashing of white, gleaming teeth.

He was protecting me;

The poor thing.

And I was powerless to call him off.

The first and only sound my attacker ever produced was a laugh,

Deep from his throat,

Dark and heavy.

And that's when Max leapt,

At least five feet in the air and clear across the kitchen,

Straight for the faceless man's neck.

Of course he never met his target.

He must have been short, probably no more than a few inches.

Something else I now ponder,

'How far, Was he close, Would it have made a difference?'

The next thing I heard was a high pitched whine

And the sharp snapping of bone.

Not a second later and there was Max.

Not two feet from my face,

Limp and still,

His eyes not looking at me, but through me.

His jaw broken and warm, red liquid running from his limp snout to meet my own on the cold flooring.

Dead to the world, long forgot,

Originally never known or acknowledged.

Just another dog who tried to protect his person.

My heart ached for him.

Seeing his body like that, so close to mine,

So close that I could reach out and touch his muzzle-

In fact I did.

Partially returning to my senses I tried to reach for him,

For comfort,

For mine as much as his own.

And it was this small action which brought my assailant's attention to me once more.

He rounded on me.

His body stepping over mine in the dimly lit room to pull my body from the ground.

My back to his chest as I was propped on my knees,

Held by his right hand flattened against my chest,

Unable to hold up my own head,

Unable to climb to my feet.

Unable to walk or talk,

Unable to fight or to flee.

I remained where he set me,

Craning forward in pain.

On the floor of my kitchen,

On that cold winter night.

In the dimly lit and slowly fading,

In the still, the silent,

alone.

Except for him.

I felt his presence and he knew that I could.

He took a moment to kneel behind me,

Before deciding.

The repositioning of aggressive hands

And the shifting of fabrics

All leading to the moment when he pulled his scarf from around his neck

And dangled it out in front of me.

Three inches from my face,

In the light of a far off candle it was the color of my newly coated kitchen floor.

Taunting me and I was helpless to move it away.

Then he took the crimson scarf in both hands

And placed it against my neck.

Soft and welcoming,

For only but a moment.

Before he tightens the grip of his fists donned in black gloves.

And all at once, the air-

There was none.

You never notice something as simple or important as oxygen,

Not until it's gone.

Hard, lean torso the only thing keeping my body straight,

Nose pressed deep into my short hair as he exhaled heavily onto the back of my neck.

Taunting me.

Every breath he took,

He took a breath from me.

Blond hair falling into my face as my natural instincts took control.

I struggled for a short while,

Which of course only made my situation worse.

My hands reaching franticly to clasp around leather clad ones,

But in the end I had no energy.

Eventually I gave into my fate.

I surrendered to the pain.

The fuzziness in my vision, in my head.

The ringing in my ears and the constriction of my chest,

Growing tighter with each passing second.

I still remember the touch of the scarf's gentle fabric,

The rough yet smooth leather against my skin.

I released myself and everything just ended.

Everything, that is, being me.

All at once without a flash of bright light or the singing of angels.

Everything just ended and I ceased to exist.

You don't know the meaning of darkness until you have died.

My only regret:

That I wasn't able to save Max in the process,

And perhaps, that I didn't leave the door unlocked so as my murderer could easily leave.

I'll never know what the attacker did with my body

And neither will anyone else.

My body was never found, not that many would have been looking

And at last I had what I always wanted.

What I craved above everything else.

Isolation.

I never wanted to be saved…

Now, being a man of medicine I had a natural gift for helping those in need,

But everyone around me always said I was distant.

That I never had any patience and that I was incapable of sympathy.

I had a habit of avoiding people like the plague,

And I found what I was looking for on that day.

What I found was death.

Was nothing.

The absence of life. The absence of existence.

Death brought me isolation,

It brought me peace.


End file.
